Domestic appliance



July 24, 1956 H. B. WALLIS ETAL DOMESTIC APPLIANCE Filed Feb; 25, 1953 INVENTOR. Harald B. Wallis Rona/ H. Why/e Attorney United States Patent DOMESTEQ APPLIANCE Harold B. Wallis and Renal H. Whyte, Dayton, Ohio, assignors to General Motors Corporation, Detroit, Mich, a corporation of Delaware Application February 25, 1953, Serial No. 338,674

1 Claim. (Cl. 34-133) This invention relates to a domestic appliance and more particularly to clothes dryers.

When clothes are washed there is always some lint disposed on the clothes. Laundry dryers tumble the clothes to provide even drying and to remove lint. Ordinarily the circulated drying air will effectively remove the lint from the drying chamber, but occasionally this air borne lint may be carried by the drum to the heater and its reflector where it may become scorched. When she smells this, the housewife may become panicky thinking that the clothes may be burning. Her state of confusion may cause her to do something to the clothes or to the dryer in a vain effort to remove the clothes from the drying chamber under illusion of preventing their scorching.

It is an object of our invention to prevent the scorching of air borne lint by the heater of a dryer.

It is another object of our invention to prevent lint from depositing on or contacting any portion of the heater or reflector.

It is another object of our invention to shield the heater and the adjacent parts in such a way that no air borne lint will deposit thereon.

These objects are attained by providing a screen over the heater and by surrounding the reflector with a shield which is cooled by the incoming air which is directed in such a manner that lint is prevented from moving toward the heater.

Further objects and advantages of the present invention will be apparent from the following description, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, wherein a preferred form of the present invention is clearly shown.

In the drawing:

Figure 1 is a vertical diagrammatic view of a dryer illustrating one form of my invention;

Figure 2 is an enlarged sectional view of the heater and shield shown diagrammatically in Figure 1; and

Figure 3 is a sectional view taken substantially along the line 33 of Figure 2.

Referring now to the drawing there is shown a laundry dryer 20 provided with an insulated drum chamber 22 containing a ventilated drum 24. At the bottom of the drum chamber 22 is a throat 26 connecting directly with an air cooled condenser 28 beneath which there is a liquid collecting receptacle 30. The throat 26 forms the outlet to the drum chamber while the rear wall of the drum chamber 22 is provided with a series of inlet holes 32 through which air enters the drum chamber 22.

Located in the upper left-hand corner of the drum chamber 22 is a sheathed tubular electric heater 34 which is made in two sections. This heater 34 is provided with a dual reflector 36. Both the heater 34 and the reflector 36 are held substantially at a 45 angle by the plate 38 to which they are attached. This plate 38 is fastened to the rear wall of the drum chamber 22.

Occasionally lint collects on the top of the condenser 28 without being moistened. Such dry lint or rolls of lint occasionally become carried by the air adjacent the drum 24 or mechanically picked up by the drum into the vicinity of the heater 34. To prevent this lint from being scorched, we provide a screen 40 extending over the heater 34 Patented July 24, 1956 between the edges of the reflector 36. This prevents any substantial amount of lint from being thrown onto the heater 34.

To prevent lint from being deposited on the upper face of the reflector 36 we provide an air cooled shield 42 which substantially completely envelops the reflector 36 but is spaced a short distance away from the reflector 36. This shield 42 is located between the reflector 36 and the inlet holes 32. This shield includes a short piece 46 fastened to the top wall 48 of the drum chamber which overlaps the adjacent edge of the reflector to prevent lint from entering the space behind the reflector. Fastened to this short piece 46 is an enclosing member 50 extending to a vertical member 54. The lower end of the member 50 is fastened to the lower portion of the vertical member 54. The upper portion of the member 54 is provided with a flange which is fastened to the top wall 48. The space above the member 50 communicates directly with the inlet holes 32. The air flowing into this space through the inlet holes 32 escapes from this space through a horizontal row of holes 56 near the top of the vertical member 54. These holes 56 may be evenly spaced but preferably they are spaced farther apart near the inlet apertures 32 and preferably the spacing of the holes 56 decreases as the distance from the holes 32 increases in order to obtain more uniform distribution of air flow from the front to the back of the dryer.

By the arrangement, the air flows in through the holes 32 cooling the shield 50 and warming the air. In this inlet space or chamber, the air then flows in a uniformly distributed pattern to the holes 56. After passing through the holes 56 the air flows downwardly between the vertical member 54 and the adjacent side wall 58 of the drum chamber until it flows through the ventilated drum 24 to the condenser 28. A fan in the bottom of the dryer 20 is provided to draw air through the drum chamber 22. Preferably the fan and the remaining portions of the dryer are constructed and arranged as disclosed in the Mc- Cormick application S. N. 298,566 filed July 12, 1952,

By the arrangement disclosed herein, lint is effectively prevented from being carried to portions of the dryer which are sufficiently hot to scorch the lint. This prevents unnecessary customer complaints because of the occasional scorching of lint.

While the form of embodiment of the invention as herein disclosed constitutes a preferred form, it is to be understood that other forms might be adopted, as may come within the scope of the claim which follows.

What is claimed is as follows:

A laundry dryer including a cabinet having a drum casing provided with a separated inlet and outlet, a rotatable ventilated drum within said casing, a heating means within said drum casing near the inlet thereof, a reflector for said heating means, a vertical member located at one side of said reflector and said inlet spaced from the wall of said casing, a second imperforate member extending from the lower portion of said vertical member to said drum casing in between said inlet and said reflector, the space between said members connecting with said inlet, the upper portion of said vertical member being provided with outlet means, said vertical member being otherwise imperforate.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,683,984 Mooney et al. Sept. 11, 1928 2,131,484 Ringwald Sept. 27, 1938 2,328,256 Breckenbridge Aug. 31, 1943 2,398,880 Broglie Apr. 23, 1946 2,487,722 Newell Nov. 8, 1949 2,506,517 Moore May 2, 1950 

